


Amusing That You Care

by adrift_me



Category: Dishonored (Video Games)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Dishonored 2, Fluff, Low Chaos, M/M, Mute!Corvo - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-07
Updated: 2017-11-07
Packaged: 2019-01-30 18:00:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,382
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12658617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/adrift_me/pseuds/adrift_me
Summary: They sing about the god's creation, heresy put into music. They sing about the boy, whose black eyes turned the tides of history.But they will never sing about the man who held that god's face and craved for little else, but to kiss his lips.





	Amusing That You Care

**Author's Note:**

> I was replaying DH2 yesterday and happened to come across the street musicians, while they played Born In The Month of Darkness song, which is my favourite one. Yet again, my heart was squeezed by feels ;_; So have some corvosider.
> 
> [Come chat with me on tumblr or give me a prompt :)](https://a-driftamongopenstars.tumblr.com/)

He rarely stops to listen to the street musicians of Karnaca. There is never time, there is always a danger of recognition, there is always a target waiting and he can’t allow himself a pause. 

But he can’t not listen to them tonight either. Nearly breaks his arm in a fall when his Blink gets him too far from the balcony across. Words catch him like a lasso and make his hand tremble this once, throwing him off the course and dropping him over the railing and onto the ground. Though he must have been quite loud, the crowd ignores him. Musicians play.

“ _ He opened his eyes, as black as a dream _ ”.

He manages to get up from the fall, nursing the injured arm as he approaches an elevated entrance to a shop nearby. Leans casually on the railing and listens in.

There aren’t many people who have eyes so black that one could get lost in them. Even less people who have a privilege of being sung about. Corvo gazes upon the musicians intently, eyes hidden behind the terrifying mask, and listens in. How sad the song is, how captivating the music of it is. It resonates with the deepest strings in his heart and he wonders how many people in this tiny street corner could say the same. After all, few if none at all have had the luck of meeting the black eyed deity in person. And though he seems mostly unperturbed by the event that made him, never talks about it, Corvo imagines he simply wants to forget that fateful day, one that created him, a god.

He has never asked him. It feels like a sacred knowledge, dangerous even. Corvo is not a curious man, only by necessity, and failing to ask the Outsider about his origin is a respectful nod to his boundaries. Hearing that story sung out to the public, heresy put into music in the plain sight of the Overseers, Corvo wonders if there is magic behind the musicians’ work. 

Lyrics describe things that Corvo doesn’t want to imagine, but his mind helpfully puts words into pictures anyway. The blighted tree and the young man whose arms are tied an altar, and a curve of a throat, punctured by the bronze of a twin-bladed knife. And the terrified face which soon relaxes into unconsciousness. And a pair of round eyes that open and the Void fills them up, pulling the colour of iris and white of the apple away.

Corvo pushes himself off the railing when the song ends. The heart tells him there is a rune nearby and it feels almost like a soothing song, knowing that a small connection to the Outsider is patiently waiting for him to pick it up. He throws a few coins in the musicians’ violin case and passes by them onto the garden bed, behind which an entrance is hidden, hammered down with logs.

To his mild surprise, he finds a shrine there, a small one, surrounded by items of living, but the owner long gone. A diary, broken and empty bottles, a piece of stale bread, dirty sheets and two buzzing runes, placed on the Outsider’s altar in offering.

He knows the Outsider is watching him, but he lingers. Takes one rune in his hands and looks at the black mark, etched into the artifact. He wonders about the meaning, why the Outsider has chosen it so many years ago. Did he even have a chance to choose, for if the song lyrics are to be trusted, he has never been given a choice at all. He pockets the rune and reaches out for another, watching the world crumble into pieces around him, bringing the Void into existence.

The Outsider materializes before him, sitting on a rocky ledge. He says something, but Corvo can’t bring himself to listen. His attention is undividedly drawn to the Outsider’s black eyes, “drained of colour”. 

When the Outsider re-materlializes to hover beside him, he reaches out.

His hand never touches the Outsider’s face as the deity coils away, words failing and body tense. He vanishes from thin air and Corvo can only hear his voice, echoing louder than his thoughts, louder than the Void’s winds, louder than existence itself.

“Why?”

He looks around with a small smile, which is not happy at all. It’s pitying. The Outsider appears beside him again, eyeing Corvo’s hand cautiously. Corvo doesn’t know what to say, realises he didn’t know even when wanted to say something with signs. What can he say, after all? That he is sorry, that he wishes he could slit the cultists’ throats for what they did, that he is there for the Outsider if he is frightened?

All those things and Corvo didn’t know he had them in his heart. They tug at his chest and make something unpleasant squirm in his stomach, as he looks at the Outsider. And he is suddenly so close.

“You don’t have to pity me, Corvo. Sorrow and fear have been washed away a long time ago, and yet I remain. Those who did it to me, they have been punished to the fullest, their life turned a nuisance, if it is any life at all. But I want to ask again, Corvo, why?”

His hand, so cold, almost ethereal, touches Corvo’s, fingers brushing over the knuckles. The Outsider looks down at it, head tilted, and then returns his gaze.

Corvo raises his palm and this time, slowly, as if trying to pet a beast, reaches out to cup the Outsider’s face. The deity does not move away.

How perfectly his face fits in a curve of Corvo’s palm, how well he can feel the gentle skin and the hollow of the cheekbones. His breathing hitches for a split moment when he realises what he is doing. He wants to pull away, but the Outsider’s hand rests on top of his and doesn’t let go.

“Do not pity me, Corvo,” he repeats with a bitter smile, one that doesn’t intend to hurt, only to state the obvious. His mouth curves, and Corvo feels the corner of his lips with a thumb and how the jaw moves. He is enthralled, touching the Outsider for this first time in the period they have known each other. Only now does he realise how much he wanted to do it. Doesn’t ask for permission to bring another hand up, the marked one, to rest it just below the jawline. He feels his fingertips touch the Outsider’s hair and it’s so much softer than he expected. But what has he expected at all?

The other hand of the Outsider covers his, and as if to respond, the mark feels warmer under his palm, even if the Outsider’s skin is without temperature at all.

“Here you are, Corvo, with a heart so big, it wants to save everyone. Even me. But I am not spiteful and seek no revenge, and neither should you on my behalf. My tale lives on in the world and I will be honest, I do not care. But it is amusing a little, that  _ you _ care.”

Corvo’s touch toughens slightly, of course, he cares. Only with that touch he can let the Outsider know. The deity smiles wider, eyes narrowing. His hands pulls Corvo’s away from his face but not before he runs the tip of his nose over the hollow of the palm, behind which the mark rests, and fleetingly kisses the skin of his fingers. He lets his hands fall, almost pushing them away, and with that gesture, so does the world, crumbling into ruins.

And then appears anew, now in busy evening Karnaca with the rush of a fountain outside and the picking of the instrument strings as musicians sing.

Corvo sits on the floor in front of the shrine, back pressed to cold stone of the building. He looks at his hand and listens how in the Month of Darkness, the Outsider was born.

The touch of a kiss still burns on his skin, and Corvo can’t help but press his lips to where the burning tingles. He is certain he can hear a soft affectionate laugh somewhere, louder than his thoughts, louder than the world.  _ As quiet as the night _ .


End file.
